Shadow Play: A WoD Collection
by Sikla Alkis
Summary: /OWoD & NWoD blend/ The shadows dance. The wolves sing. The beasts of folklore come out to play. Based on a WoD chronicle, this collection demonstrates how those in the World of Darkness live, from the mere mortal to the otherwordly creatures
1. I: Strix :I

_Diana Konstantinyevna Lebedeva is copyrighted to myself. The Old and New World of Darkness is copyright White Wolf Games. All fiction is based on a WoD chronicle I have participated in._

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><p><em><strong><span>Shadow Play: A WoD Collection<span>**_

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><p><strong>I: Strix :I<strong>

_"The feeling...it's always there."_

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><p>Black claws. Black, bloody, feathery claws, still stinging from the sudden sprouting of the pinfeathers. Her wing knitted itself back together as she concentrated, sweet and sustaining vitae coursing through the broken bone and flesh. Her yellow eyes were wide, angry, teeth still extended and bared, blood all over her face and shirt. The hunter was covered in woods, almost completely exsanguinated by the time she had cut him down. He had not been alone - she could still hear his partner's footsteps as the man ran for his life. Her new talons swiped at the ground, gouging deep into the leaf litter as she spat a Russian curse.<p>

She had not meant to kill him. She had been trying to feed quietly, stalking her prey and leading him away from his partner with false sounds and dodgy trails. Then, she would have finished her meal with the other hunter, dragged them to the edge of the wood, and called 911 for an ambulance. It was not her way to take a kine's life willingly - hunters were slain so she could keep hidden, but other mere mortals were of no threat to her. Perhaps if they saw her, she would grab a quick bite to eat, using the effects of feeding to make it seem like a dream.

One of the hunters had a lit match and lighter fluid. As soon as he held the two together, she had panicked. They had taken advantage of her sudden lunge, filling her with bullets. One sliced along her arm with a hunting knife, and she had lost vitae steadily, until...

She shook her head. She had to get the blood off of her and get out of the general area. There would be more than just a couple of vampire-whackers the next time a hunting party came through. Feeling her wing straighten back into a proper angle, she spread both - white-striped-black, massive and red-splattered - and gave a pump. Frenzy might have been her bane, but the Gangrel curse had its blessings, and a particularly terrifying encounter with a pyrokinetic VASCU agent had gifted her with flight. Perhaps the universe thought it would make her less prone to her outbursts, and make it so that the enemy could not chase her as easily.

In the light of the graceful moon, glowing potently in full upon the Pine Barrens, the she-vampire made her migratory flight. The Gangrel clan wandered as a pilgrim might, always to some unknown, unheard of destination with equally unknown and unheard of purpose. For twenty-five years, she had been one of them, but even before her current troubles, she had been running. From two separate governments and a mad ex-employer, she had fled, and the ancilla who had found her was impressed with her reputation. Funny how things worked - he could have handed her over to the FBI, maybe pulled a few strings to get the local government to leave him in peace in exchange. Instead, however, he had bitten down, and when she had awoken with the taste of fresh vitae, he'd taught her a few things.

She was the strix of Roman mythology - a deformed, owlish monster who drank the blood of innocents. Diana Konstantinyevna Lebedeva fought as hard as she could against it, but she could not escape. They would keep pursuing her until they found her, arrested her and questioned her, demanding to know how several hundred seized Nazi files had ended up in the hands of Cheiron. Even more of an explanation, they would say, was needed to justify why Nazi research had been used by a pharmaceutical company. Every time they cornered her, that fear of Final Death, the execution that awaited her, would well up and consume her. And then, she would fight them and the beast, until a flame flickered before her or too much of her vitae was lost. The animal in her would then scream, clawing its way to the surface, and then, the Owl - not Diana - would attack, and gorge, and slaughter.

But as they say, some secrets are best taken to the grave.


	2. II: Web Cutter :II

_Higgs Gearson is copyrighted to Talon 88.1. The Old and New World of Darkness is copyright White Wolf Games. All fiction is based on a WoD chronicle I have participated in._

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><p><em><strong><span>Shadow Play: A WoD Collection<span>**_

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><p><strong>II: Web-Cutter :II<strong>

_"Tck, tck, tck...something is not right, tck, tck, tck..."_

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><p>This part of the Web is not right. Something eats at the Web, burning through it to get away. <em>Tck, tck, tck <em>- it will not take long to fix, but it is still an inconvenience. Calcify, recreate, fix the Web - it is done, the Web is maintained. But there are too many holes, so many holes, that we must fix. The Matriarch weaves for a reason - this anomaly is disturbing. _Tck, tck, tck, _such damage is -

_There!_

I rally and hiss to call the other spiders. Something is stepping through the Gauntlet - _tck, tck, _we cannot repair the hole. The Gurahl again - he steps through too easily. How can he tear such holes? But no shapechanger should tear such holes. His bulk would be good for the web, beautifully calcified and tied down. A Drone, maybe, to come back to the Matriarch with. And what does he carry, _tck tck, tck_? Something small is in his arms, a child. The child radiates something strange, and the Webs weaken.

_Tck, tck, tck. _Is it possible to bind a spirit into flesh? A living talisman of power, instead of something inanimate to be crafted, as the Matriarch has made so? Something is wrong, too wrong. The Weaver binds all mankind, but this little one seems to be outside of the Web. She melts the strands, weakens our reality - we must calcify and repair, _tck tck tck_. I call the spiders, we set to work, reweaving and strengthening our Web. The Gauntlet should not be pierced so easily - this grows more and more disturbing for me, _tck, tck, tck_.

Some of us try and get into the small pocket he carves. He closes it off, and the Webs surround him - or do they? It seems we cannot find his reality, _tck tck tck_. A trickster, now are we? We thought that was something the Nuwisha specialized in. He shouldn't cling onto such frivolous and unfixed spaces - so unclean, so disorderly. He doesn't even keep the grass and the trees trimmed, letting them grow Wyld. Does he not know what the Wyld does to us? So many holes, no form, eating everything away. And this is a particularly damaged patch of Web, _tck tck tck_.

Such things are not good for the Web. The Web is perfect, whole and formed, _tck tck_. Perhaps the mother will send us some soldier Drones to help us - Bricklayers would also be welcome. The Gauntlet is there for a reason - we must solidify it better, especially with this Umbral traveller and his strange girl, _tck tck tck_.


	3. III: Twist of Dreams :III

_Lady Siana is copyrighted to Heart of the Revolution. The Old and New World of Darkness is copyright White Wolf Games. All fiction is based on a WoD chronicle I have participated in._

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><p><em><strong><span>Shadow Play: A WoD Collection<span>**_

* * *

><p><strong>III: Twist of Dreams :III<strong>

_So many years, so many hours, so many eons of fading..._

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><p>The trail of dreams, glamour and creativity, creation of her, following in her wake. My last true servant, my power wanes, just as the memory of Arcadia does fade. My knight, my sword, my shield, you have seen it - seen it because of her, and it will twist in your dreams. Twist and writhe, it shall, and grow in the dreaming, bask in the light of a chimerical sun, and you will nurture it. You, my dear Siana, will lead her back, back to me and to all that is right and wild.<p>

You don't realize, do you? You're charmed. You're blessed. You have my mark and I have you in my eyes - my many shifting eyes. I have always been there, walking beside you, flying above you, swimming in the lakes and streams, in the pool of everyone's dreams. Ebb and flow, glamour's glow, from each freehold to each wound that I heal. I shape, I mould, I create, for I have always created, and I am growing weaker. The metaphorical hands of clay are hard, calloused and broken, and nobody dreams anymore - nobody but the young, the few and the bold. And you are one of those, even though you've lost your ancestral stronghold.

Lead them back, as you might lead children. You are the gentle hand, the playful hand, the hand that I've admittedly bitten. But all my incarnations have their own thoughts and feelings, alien as they might seem the farther away they are from your reality. Yes, so true, so sad...but you know much about this, don't you Elysiana?


End file.
